Sex Offenders' Homes to Be Marked With Pumpkin Symbol

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ANNAPOLIS " Sex offenders in Maryland have begun receiving paper signs in the mail that read "No candy at this residence," which they must post on their front doors or possibly face a parole violation.

The signs began arriving last week in the mailboxes of the about 1,200 violent and child-sex offenders across Maryland. The signs were accompanied by a letter explaining they must stay at home, turn off outside lights and not answer the door on Halloween.

Maryland is also distributing pamphlets statewide to warn families to stay away from homes with the pumpkin signs.

"Halloween provides a rare opportunity for you to demonstrate to your neighbors that you are making a sincere effort to change the direction of your life," the letter to sex offenders reads.

"Because Halloween is a holiday in which large numbers of children interact with strangers, the concern among parents and other community members about sexual offenders in their neighborhoods is naturally intensified during this time of year," Patrick McGee, interim director of the state's Division of Parole and Probation, wrote in the Oct. 1 letter.

Maryland, which began the program in 2005, is among a number of states placing Halloween restrictions on sex offenders. Maryland's regulations are almost identical to those adopted in Missouri, where four convicted sex offenders and the American Civil Liberties Union are challenging the state law in federal court.

"We've had very good results," Wonda Adams, said a supervisor at the Parole and Probation Division and coordinator of the Halloween watch program.

"Our goal is public safety, and in keeping with that we need to make sure that the individuals under our supervision are provided with the enhanced supervision that we're committed to."

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,438725,00.html

This is a great idea, I think more communities need to adopt such laws and regulations. It just amazes me though that the ACLU would defend a bunch of child molesters and their right to hand candy out to children when these people have raped children. What in Gods green earth are they thinking. I understand they take on the cases where people’s rights are in question, but there has to be a limit. They did the same thing with NAMBLA.

Now I know there are people who have been put into the sexual offender list that only got caught peeing on a lamp post. I know there are people on the list who have never done anything to children but that pushes the point of having different lists. Child molesters should have to have a tattoo on their face that marks them for ever, and that they can't hide such a tattoo.

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@Baldimo,

Sound good to me. Hopefully they will send law agents around to make sure it is being done.

1 Reply

@Chesterton,

It would only require a drive by and even a knock if it isn't up.

0 Replies

I always thought the traditional, American way of marking people is by setting up burning crosses in their front yards. One never ceases to learn....

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@Thomas,

Theres a big difference between being an idiot racist and making sure innocent your children don't stumble into the hands of a child rapist. I'm supprised someone of your age doesn't know the difference Thomas. Do you support child rapists?

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@Baldimo,

Baldimo wrote:

Theres a big difference between being an idiot racist and making sure innocent your children don't stumble into the hands of a child rapist. I'm supprised someone of your age doesn't know the difference Thomas. Do you support child rapists?

I'm surprised someone of your age doesn't know the difference, Baldimo.....the difference, that is, between not approving of a particular action taken in relation to sex offenders, and "supporting" them.

The tactic you used above is so dishonest and illogical that I am suprised you had the effrontery to use it.

1 Reply

@dlowan,

Why not mark their houses on a night when children are out and about looking for candy from neighbors? I'm not saying mark their houses full time. Now marking their faces so everyone they pass knows to keep away is something that while extreme is still something I support. Can you look at a child rapist and tell who they are? I know I can't so why not make them marked for what they have done. I'm about protecting the children screw these bastards and their right to privacy. If they wanted to keep any sense of privacy then they shouldn't have been raping children who are the true innocent among us.

1 Reply

@Baldimo,

1) Marking someone's house with a pumpkin does nothing to make sure he or she doesn't rape a child. Most child rapists are the children's parents or siblings. In this large majority of cases, the pumpkin is useless because the victims live in the same houses as their attackers whether they want to or not.

In the small minority of remaining cases, where the child rapist pulls the child into a hedge, the pumpkin is useless because it's installed in the rapist's house, not in the hedge where the child can see it.

2) I don't support child rapists, but I oppose pillorying people for public amusement. I oppose pillorying people for possible enticement of a lynch mob. And that's exactly what your pumpkin is. It serves no useful purpose.

1 Reply

@Thomas,

Thomas wrote:

I always thought the traditional, American way of marking people is by setting up burning crosses in their front yards. One never ceases to learn....

I always thought a leftist tendency to equate identifying child sex offenders in order to protect children as being as bad as burning crosses in somebody's front yard as not only hugely non sequitur but really really amazing in its myopia. Maybe those pumpkins will engender hostility from neighbors. I hope they do because anyboy who would brutalize, traumatize, or intentionally harm a child deserves all the hostility that society can muster. Child sex offenders should not be living in neighborhoods where children are present. But if the leftists insist that they are, it is not asking too much that parents know where they are and keep their children away. They'll probably be more careful letting their children wander near those hedges too.

If the practice protects a single child, it is well worth it.

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@Foxfyre,

Foxfyre wrote:

Thomas wrote:

I always thought the traditional, American way of marking people is by setting up burning crosses in their front yards. One never ceases to learn....

I always thought a leftist tendency to equate identifying child sex offenders in order to protect children as being as bad as burning crosses in somebody's front yard as not only hugely non sequitur but really really amazing in its myopia. Maybe those pumpkins will engender hostility from neighbors. I hope they do because anyboy who would brutalize, traumatize, or intentionally harm a child deserves all the hostility that society can muster. Child sex offenders should not be living in neighborhoods where children are present. But if the leftists insist that they are, it is not asking too much that parents know where they are and keep their children away. They'll probably be more careful letting their children wander near those hedges too.

If the practice protects a single child, it is well worth it.

another strict constitutionalist speaks.

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Yup. The Constitution dictates that we shall be a people of laws. It is against the law to sexually molest or assualt children everywhere. And, given the high propensity of child sex offenders to be repeat offenders, any place with any decency protects children from exposure to that danger. If you have never been found guilty of molesting a child, then you have no problem whatsoever.

1 Reply

@Foxfyre,

Alright. I notice for the record that Foxfyre cannot name a single specific difference between the pumpkin and the burning cross.

That said, I need to back-pedal just a little bit because the specific ordinance Baldimo quoted is strictly limited to Halloween -- when lots of children do knock on lots of strangers' doors. That makes the ordinance a little bit more defensible than the cross-burning.

4 Replies

@Foxfyre,

Foxfyre wrote:

Thomas wrote:

I always thought the traditional, American way of marking people is by setting up burning crosses in their front yards. One never ceases to learn....

I always thought a leftist tendency to equate identifying child sex offenders in order to protect children as being as bad as burning crosses in somebody's front yard as not only hugely non sequitur but really really amazing in its myopia. Maybe those pumpkins will engender hostility from neighbors. I hope they do because anyboy who would brutalize, traumatize, or intentionally harm a child deserves all the hostility that society can muster. Child sex offenders, especially those still on parole, should not be living in neighborhoods where children are present. But if the leftists insist that they are, it is not asking too much that parents know where they are and keep their children away. They'll probably be more careful letting their children wander near those hedges too.

If the practice protects a single child, it is well worth it.

0 Replies

@Thomas,

Thomas wrote:

Foxfyre wrote:
I always thought a leftist tendency to equate identifying child sex offenders in order to protect children as being as bad as burning crosses in somebody's front yard as not only hugely non sequitur but really really amazing in its myopia.

What, specifically, would be different if the pumpkins weren't there, and crosses were burning in the sex offender's front yard?

Burning crosses symbolize something quite different than posting a sign warning parents to keep their kids away from a known sex offender. I'm surprised that you didn't know that. And it doesn't matter WHO the sex offender is whether parent, other relative, neighbor, or somebody else. Any can present an unacceptable high risk to children.

If you have EVER had first hand experience dealing with a child who has been brutalized by a sex offender, I doubt we would even be having this discussion at all. Such predators can never ever be trusted in unsupervised company of children ever again. The risk is too great and the safety and well being of the kids simply has to come first.

2 Replies

@Thomas,

Care to provide some facts about it being a childs parents or siblings that are the most common rapists?

The pumpkin on the house warns the children to stay away from the home. This was for trick r' treating on halloween, not for everyday.

Why is it when people take a step to protect children there are people like you and the ACLU who cry foul? I'm sure you mean well but all you do is protect these bastards.

1 Reply

@Baldimo,

Baldimo wrote:

Care to provide some facts about it being a childs parents or siblings that are the most common rapists?

According to this fact sheet from the Department of Veterans' Affairs, 30% of the perpetrators are relatives, 60% other acquaintances, and only 10% strangers.

That means I should have added "and acquaintances" to my list, and was wrong not to. But my omission doesn't affect my main point: that strangers are a tiny minority of child abusers.

0 Replies

@Foxfyre,

Foxfyre wrote:

If you have EVER had first hand experience dealing with a child who has been brutalized by a sex offender, I doubt we would even be having this discussion at all.

I think we would. Note that dlowan is kind of on my side in this discussion. She not only does have first hand experience with a child who has been brutalized by a sex offender -- she makes her living dealing first-hand with such children. (Sorry for dragging your job into this, Deb -- I know you don't like that.)

1 Reply

@Thomas,

I am not so sure I trust those lists. People move around, and someone else may be living in the house (I think I've read something that described that happening a lot.) I'm also not sure that every person on those lists is guilty, as railroading can happen, or that community shunning signage on a house is a proper mode to deal with the problem if someone is guilty. (And I agree with Thomas about who the offenders most often are.)
Further, what are children doing trick or treating without a parent accompanying them on a presumably dark night?

0 Replies

If a person who is not a sex offender receives a notice to display a pumpkin, that can be cleared up in a matter of minutes by simply proving who he is. I would concede that sex offenders who do not wish to be subjected to the embarrassment of publicly identifying themselves in their neighborhood could avoid the pumpkin brand by agreeing to leave home on Halloween and would make such leaving completely verifiable to their parole officers.

That still does not protect the kids selling their school projects or Girl Scout cookies door to door though. I would support legislation that prohibits child sex offenders from living in neighborhoods where children are present. But if that too much violates the sensibilities of the criminal rights' crowd, I do not have a problem with the house being marked and children being instructed not to visit those houses.

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@Thomas,

Thomas wrote:

That said, I need to back-pedal just a little bit because the specific ordinance Baldimo quoted is strictly limited to Halloween -- when lots of children do knock on lots of strangers' doors. That makes the ordinance a little bit more defensible than the cross-burning.

Until the next morning when this blood thirsty nation wakes up and finds these peoples homes destroyed, cars destroyed , the people attacked and any other violent thing you can think of happening to these people.

Hear me now. I am NOT defending child perps. NOT NOT NOT defending these people.

What I am arguing against is this out for blood behavior that people seem to have. And tagging people whos lives are useless to the vast majority of people gives people a need to be a 'hero' of sorts , feeds their desire for a type of lynch mob behavior and they can begin to take out theri anger and frustration on these people. ( even though I am on board with the idea that they DESERVE it.. )
Just look for the pumpkin and shoot ya know?

I stand on both sides of the fence with this situation though.
Child perps do not deserve privacy. But putting things on their doors so that they lose almost any chance of living a normal life and possibly rehabilitating.. ya know.. Im just not sure. Convicted ones are already watched by the law. As someone else said, it is the ones who have not been found that are the most dangerous.

If parents want their kids safe during halloween, they should go with them.
Screw the pumpkin.
If there are parents standing at the end of the walk way with their kids, they are safe.
It is the children who are allowed to go out by themselves and not be supervised in anyway that could be in danger. Halloween night or not.

0 Replies

Sex Offenders' Homes to Be Marked With Pumpkin Symbol

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